Rub al Khali

Today we started our little expedition into the Rub al Khali. We started in Riyadh at 07:30 in the morning and driving past Huffuf we arrived at the HQ in Batha at 2.30 pm. This unit is at the border crossing to Qatar. We had a very warm welcome by the commander and great hospitality. We received a briefing by the staff and after a nice lunch we where escorted to our accommodation. It was the guesthouse belonging to the Customs authorities.
Nice afternoon writing our report and waiting for lunch to arrive. This is the beginning of a nice and exciting trip. We are at the entrance of the Empty Quarter and tomorrow we will have 8 hours of driving through one of the most exciting deserts in the world.

Going around again

Today we start the third day of inspections along the red sea coast, wonderful wx and a good crew, more when I come back tonight.
This trip in total was a very unique experience. I have not seen so miserable working conditions than on this tour. It is unbelievable how rotten and filthy everything is. The amount of trash around these posts is incredible and if you consider the enormous quantities of plastic bottles and plastic bags you see just along the coast it must be impossible to remove them and tidy the place up.
I was so glad to be back in Riyadh in y villa. What a challenge to modernize this country.

In 30 Degrees C

It is nice here after the chilly temps in Riyadh. The hotel is ok, nothing fancy. The restaurant has only 6 dishes, which you get bored of pretty soon. The surrounding is a bit rotten and dirty. One huge construction site and that is probably why this hotel is here in the first place so the businessmen have a place to stay. The English language is not very common here. Tomorrow we start with our inspection of the locations for our project. More to come.

On My Way to Jazan

Early morning in Riyadh, it is only 10 C and it’s still dark. So I get up, get dressed and make my way to the wonderful airport. This facility is a mess, no service and no flair at all. Jut concrete and people who don’t like to work there. Parked the car and checked in. On my way to the security check I discovered that I still had my heavy-duty pocketknife in one of the many pockets of my field gear pants. That is not a problem over here. The guy at the monitor is mere interested in a chat with his pal than in watching the monitor and see what is being brought on board. You get away with everything here. A sub-machine gun over the shoulder would raise some suspicion I guess. I stuck it into my backpack and no problem. Still the sound at the little detection frame would go of each time I go through. The other guy did not really care, he sent me back twice, made me take my shoes off, that’s what he is supposed to do in situations like this and then he let me through shrugging his shoulders. The obvious reason was two pens in my pen pocket on my left sleeve.
Anyhow I am waiting for my flight and the sun is coming out. All is well in Saudi Arabia, it is a different world after all and one cannot compare and should not.

Travel to Jizan

Tomorrow I will fly to Jizan, the most southwestern corner of the Kingdom. It's the springboard to the islands in the Red Sea. Let us see what is up there. The wx certainly will be much better than here in Riyadh.

Not enough time

When I started this site I thought I had enough time to post something on a regular basis. It turned out be a bit different. There are not enough hours in the day to do it all. Between all the other obligations I barely find time for some private things. When I am back home in the evening I normally take my time for a run on the treadmill and have dinner, after that I often am really worn out and tired. On top of this it was planned that I travel a lot through this country, that was not the case so far. A few trips to the north and one week at th east coast, other than that just here an Munich. Not that exciting. I hope that there will be a chance to what I had planned. We will see, there is always hope. Have a nice day and hang in there once in while I will have the time to post even some pictures again.